How Ruddock's policy helped drive daughter overseas

Meet the Ruddocks, Kirsty and Philip ... "You do feel a bit let down that you can't change his view on things and that you're not getting through to him." Photo: Courtesy ABC TV

The daughter of the Immigration Minister, Philip Ruddock, is so distressed by his tough immigration policies that she has left the country to work as a volunteer for an aid organisation.

Kirsty Ruddock, 30, said she found it difficult to reconcile her father's hard line on immigration with the values of compassion he brought her up with.

She told the ABC's Australian Story program, to be aired tonight, that she was appalled by mandatory detention, particularly of children, and with the Government's handling of the Tampa affair. "I have decided to live overseas ... with a program called Youth Ambassadors," Ms Ruddock says.

"Very much I am motivated by wanting to go and live and work in a developing country, but another reason behind leaving, I suppose, is to get away from what I see very much as the daily grind in terms of reading about the politics that my father is involved with ...

"It's very difficult to be his daughter because I very much want to be my own person and I have very different views from him as well. It would be fair to say I'm opposed to the mandatory detention system and certainly the detention of children in particular, and I have raised that on a number of occasions. ");document.write("

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"I've also been very involved in human rights organisations and particularly Amnesty International, and they are, I suppose, one of the organisations that have been highly critical of his portfolio, with just cause."

She had asked her father not to wear his Amnesty International badge when discussing immigration matters as the organisation opposed his policies.

"Obviously you know I love my dad, but I do find it very difficult because sometimes you do feel a bit let down that you can't change his view on things and that you're not getting through to him, as well as that somehow it's my fault [laugh] that what he is doing is wrong."

Ms Ruddock told Australian Story producer Helen Grasswill she found it difficult when people presumed she shared her father's views.

The program painted a portrait of a loving family strained by the strong disagreement between father and daughter.

Mr Ruddock's wife, Heather, and younger daughter, Caitlin, also lawyers, appear in the program, but do not reveal their view on the immigration policies.

Heather Ruddock said: "I find it quite hurtful when you might walk through a demonstration ... and you've got people shouting out 'you're a mass murderer, you're a racist, blah, blah, blah'... One thing he does not have is a racist bone in his body ..." But she feared many people supported him for the wrong reasons.

Mr Ruddock stressed he was proud of both his daughters. "I don't expect my family to be parrots. She is a tenacious, competent lawyer. I am proud of the fact that she does care."